o I have now completed L’Etape du Tour, the hardest stage of the Tour de France!
The pros will be doing it this coming Saturday, so it will be worth watching and seeing how beautiful but tough the route is. As it happened it was somewhat less mountainous than expected – at the last minute the organisers took one of the mountains out, as there have been extensive rockfalls there and they couldn’t guarantee our safety. Slightly disappointing, but made up for by the fact that the rest of the route was still very challenging, especially as it was extremely hot – the temperature hit 39C on the final climb! This was in any case by far the hardest climb, and many people gave up and were sitting/lying in the shade or struggling up on foot. I was proud to complete the whole route on my bike (unlike Froome!) and in reasonably good shape.
Tim Phillips
